the children who waited
by batterytriplicate
Summary: what if the doctor had crashed in rory's backyard?


When there is the _crash-bang_ in Rory Williams' garden, he isn't praying to Santa. He's sitting in his bed, flashlight clutched between his fists and staring mutely at the crack in his wall, because his da is out and Rory is home alone for the first time and things sound _louder_ at night. Georgie is sitting beside him, keeping his one button eye on the crack, as well. Amelia is the one who would start telling ghost stories, and probably go right to sleep after, but the stories linger in Rory's head. So, Georgie is sitting here, until Amelia can be beside him.

She's probably going to run away some time tonight; it's a Tuesday, and Tuesdays are when her parents go out to meet her _Awful Aunt Sharon_. Amelia packs up the little pack she ties to a stick like _real hobos, Rory_ and normally stomps over to his house. His da likes Amelia, thinks she's funny and charming and outgoing like Rory isn't, so she normally gets to stay until her parents come home and notice she's gone.

But Amelia isn't here yet, so Rory is stuck taking over watching the crack until Amelia comes and investigates. Which is when he hears the bang, and he jumps out his bed, landing hard on the floor, and looks closer at the crack, then out at the window. That's when he sees the blue box, laying among the pieces of what had been his da's shed.

Rory's mouth hangs open, and he watches as a man climbs out of the box. He thinks of the first aid kit in the cabinet in the bathroom, and of the man, and then thinks that whatever the box is, it's probably crashed, and he sets his little jaw and runs to grab it. He clutches it to his chest as he stumbles down the steps, and down into the garden.

The man is wearing tattered clothes, and he's sopping wet, and he stares at Rory with an intense sort of fascination.

"Er," Rory says, clinging tight to the first aid kit, pressing it up against his chest like a shield, "Hello. Are you hurt?"

The man blinks, glancing down at him, clinging to the side of the box, and says, "No, I burned all that out. Brand spanking new!" He enthuses, and waves around his arms.

He sounds a bit mad, but Rory remembers Amelia flapping her arms at Mels during recess a few weeks ago in the exact same way, and takes in a deep breath, staring mutely at the box, then back at the man.

The man grins wide like he doesn't quite know how, and keeps talking. "Can I have an apple?" He asks. "I love apples. Maybe I'm having a craving—that's new!"

"You're soaking wet," Rory says, staring.

"I had a long fall down," the man continues cheerfully, swinging his legs over the side of the box. "All the way down to the library."

"I don't—you're wet, though," Rory says, a touch hopelessly.

"I landed in the swimming pool."

"You said were in the library," Rory says, staring.

"So was the swimming pool," he says cheerfully, and hops out of the box. He's wearing trainers with his tattered business clothes, and for some reason, that's one of the weirdest parts of all. He stares at the shoes as the man staggers forward.

"Apple," he says, stumbling forwards, "how abou—"

He lets out a choked out groaning noise, collapsing to the ground, and Rory swings around the first aid kit, ready to help.

"Are you okay, mister?" He asks urgently.

"No, I'm all right," he groans, pushing himself to sitting, pressing a hand against his chest. "I'm okay, this all perfectly nor—"

He hesitates, lets out a little noise, and opens his mouth. A stream of golden, glittery _stuff_ comes out of his mouth, melting away in the air like he's breathing on a cold day. It isn't a cold day, though, and Rory's never seen anyone breathe _gold_ before.

"What was _that?_ " He asks, leaning forwards, staring, and the man blinks at him.

"Too complicated for your tiny brain," he says. "Long story short, I'm cooking."

" _Cooking?"_ Rory says, blinking at him. He's almost certainly mad, and Amelia would almost certainly get along with him, and they would act like a bag of crazy cats. He doesn't really know what that means, but his da says it when Amelia and Mels get into one of their _moods_.

"I said it was complicated," he says, and continues, hopping abruptly to his feet. "Now! I'm the Doctor. Do everything I tell you, don't ask stupid questions, and don't wander off." He beams, still looking like his face isn't quite familiar, and spins, walking off. He faceplants abruptly into the wall, and then lands hard on his back, on the ground, and Rory reaches hopefully for the first aid kit.

"Are you okay?" He asks. "I've got some bandages."

The man blinks up at Rory. "Early days," he says. "Steering's still off."

"That doesn't sound good," Rory says, and helps pull him to his feet.

Five minutes later, the sopping wet Doctor is wrapped up in the beach towel that his da lays over the car seats after he and Amelia go to the pool in the summers, and Rory is rummaging around in the first aid kit, triumphantly pulling out the stethoscope and mini-flashlight.

"Look at the light," Rory directs, and shines it directly into his eyes.

"Ow," the man complains, blinking hard as he looks away. "What's that gonna do?"

Rory blinks at him. "You're a doctor, shouldn't you know?" He says, and pulls his face towards him again. "Eyes on the light, then. Don't move your head."

The Doctor sighs, and says, "Can I have that apple?"

"After," he says, and turns off the little light before putting on the stethoscope, pressing it against his chest. He blinks.

"That's a really fast pulse," he says.

"Oh, no," the Doctor says. "Two hearts. Perfectly normal."

"Two _hearts?"_ Rory repeats, staring at him, a little slackjawed. The Doctor nods, and Rory shakes himself, before he tells the Doctor, "Deep breaths."

He obligingly takes a deep breath in, and out, and Rory slings the stethoscope back over his neck, handing the Doctor the apple. He took an eager bite, only to spit it back out, the piece flying past Rory.

"I hate apples!" The Doctor complains. "Apples are rubbish!"

"You said you loved apples," Rory says in confusion. "You said you were having a craving for them."

"No, that's rubbish," the Doctor says. "I love yogurt, gimme yogurt!"

"I don't have yogurt," Rory says.

"Who doesn't have yogurt?" He demands.

"Me," he says. "We just don't have it."

He lets out a dramatic, unsettling sigh, sitting down heavy at the table. "That's a letdown —what was your name?"

"Rory," he says. "Rory Williams."

"Oh," he says, looking a little disappointed, before rallying ever so slightly. "Solid name, Rory Williams. Very… ordinary." He rubs his hand together. "So, Rory Williams, why can't you give me any decent food?"

They cycle through bacon, beans, toast, carrots, cola, a brownie, and some ice cream. Rory gives him the best disappointed look he can manage whenever the Doctor spits something back out, the same one he gives Amelia and Mels when they goes a step too far, and it works because the Doctor cleans up after himself.

He breaks three plates, five glasses, and manages to lose a spoon in the garden before he manages to concoct something to satisfy him.

"Parents," the Doctor says delightedly, and slurps down a mouthful of custard, leaving him with a yellow mustache that curves upwards when he smiles, like he's getting used to it. "Where are your parents?"

"Don't have a mum," Rory says, fussing with one of the leftover pieces of toast. "My da's out."

"And he left you all alone?" the Doctor says indignantly, after licking a stripe of custard off a fish stick.

"It was an emergency," Rory says. "My gran's getting surgery. S'just her hip, though. Not that bad."

He's parroting what his da told him, but he's still worried. It must show on his face, because the Doctor says reassuringly, "Course it's not all that bad! Goodness, Rory, you don't seem particularly shaken at all."

Rory privately thinks he's either very oblivious or he's just being kind, because Rory's very shaken, but he doesn't say anything to contradict him.

"Weird man climbs out of a box, you just offer him a checkup, eat some toast, make him clean up after himself."

Rory shrugs a little, feeling bashful.

"Is there anything that scares you?"

He means it as a joke, and Rory can tell he means it as a joke, but his eyes slant upwards towards his bedroom anyways. The Doctor's ears practically perk up, like Mrs. Dawson's dog's does whenever you've got a ham sandwich with you.

Rory hesitates, and shrugs again, tearing at the crusts of the toast. "My da says I'm imagining things," he begins.

"Nothing wrong with imagining things," the Doctor declares. "I imagine things all the time, it tends to get me out of quite a lot of trouble. Or into it, depending. What are you supposedly imagining, Rory Williams?"

Rory hesitates, and begins, "There's this… crack, in my bedroom wall. And I swear it talks at night, I'm not telling stories," he adds, defiantly, before he recalls that this Doctor person is probably- _maybe_ an adult and _you shouldn't talk to adults like that_. His jaw snaps shut, and the Doctor leaps to his feet, food forgotten.

"D'you know what?" He says, leaning forwards ever so slightly, putting his face level with Rory's. "I think that it must be a very scary crack in your wall. Shall we go have a look?"

Rory took in a shaky breath, and nodded.

"Atta boy," the Doctor says, ruffling his hair. The pair of them made a face at each other.

"No, that's not the sort of thing I'd say at all, I agree," the Doctor says, and wipes his hand on Rory's shirt. "Lead on, then, we're ignoring that."

Rory hovers anxiously near his bedroom door as the Doctor creeps forwards, pressing his hands against the wall, his face more serious that it had been the whole time he'd been there.

"There've been some cowboys in here," the Doctor murmurs. "Not actual cowboys—though that can happen," he amends, before his eyes land on Georgie, sitting forgotten, knocked off the bed when Rory had jumped.

"Hello, who's this?" He asks, picking up Georgie, running a careful hand over his worn fur.

"Georgie," Rory says, curling his hands into fists, suddenly wanting to cuddle him close. "He was my mum's."

The Doctor smiles, runs a finger over Georgie's black button eye, tracing it down to the monkey's tail. "Seems like a good sort, your mum." He carefully tucks away Georgie, and then steps forwards, closer to the crack, as Rory hovers anxiously closer.

"This wall's solid, but the crack doesn't go all the way through it," he says thoughtfully, pressing his fingers up against it. "So, here's a thing—where's the draught coming from?"

He runs a blue thing that makes a little buzzing noise along the wall, then pulls it close, staring. "Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey. You know what the crack is?"

"What?" Rory asks, forcing himself to step forwards.

"What?" Amelia asks, from behind them, and both the Doctor and Rory scream a little bit, leaping back, as Amelia happily digs through the bowl of ice cream the Doctor had abandoned after passionately declaring every fault of vanilla beans which was _too similar to beans, rory! i thought we agreed_ _ **no beans!**_

"Hallo," Amelia says. "There's a smoking box in your garden, Rory, did you know?"

"It's my box," the Doctor says, drawing himself up proudly.

"And who're you?" She asks, setting aside the bowl.

"I'm the Doctor," he says, before snapping his fingers and pointing to Amelia's hobo-pack and cackling, the pack actually tied over a stick and slung over her shoulder, because Amelia was what Rory's da called _a character_. "And who're you?"

"Amelia," Amelia says. "Amelia Pond."

"Proper name, that!" The Doctor declares gleefully. "Amelia Pond, like a name in a fairytale!"

"I got _ordinary_ ," Rory complains, and Amelia sets down her hobo pack.

"I like your name," Amelia says.

"Nothing wrong with a good, strong bit of ordinary," the Doctor says, and then grimaces. "Eugh. Couldn't say that with a straight face."

"But what's the crack?" Amelia urges. "I've been telling Rory to call the police, and your box said police. Are you a doctor _and_ a policeman?"

"You know, I'll tell you two something funny," the Doctor says thoughtfully, running his fingers along the crack. "If you knocked this wall down, the crack would stay put. Because the crack isn't in the wall."

"Where is it, then?" Rory asks.

"Everywhere," the Doctor declares. "In everything. It's a split in the skin of the world—" He ran his fingers across the crack, slowly. "Two parts of space and time that should never have touched, pressed together... right here, in the wall of your bedroom."

He presses his ear against the wall, and Rory wants to rush forwards, and pull him away. In a weird way, it's more scary to have him so serious about this than it was to have a mad man throwing all of the food out of the cupboards.

"Sometimes—can you hear...?"

"A voice," Rory breathes out, and he and Amelia huddle close, subconsciously. "Yes."

"Rory and I spent a whole night just listening to it," Amelia informs him importantly, but doesn't draw any closer. The Doctor dumps a cup full of water out on the floor, and Rory doesn't even move to make him clean up after himself.

He carefully slid the glass against the wall, pressing it against a precise point in the crack, and put his ear against the other end.

 _Prisoner Zero has escaped._

The Doctor pulls back slightly, glancing towards the two children. "Prisoner Zero?"

"Has escaped," Amelia finishes, and Rory is grateful that she's here, this loud and vivacious friend that draws away all the attention. "That's why I said Rory should call the police. What does it mean?"

The Doctor steps back from the wall, and turns to them. "It means that, on the other side of this wall, there's a prison, and they've lost a prisoner. Rory, do you know what that means?"

Rory shakes his head, and he deeply, deeply wants to reach forwards and snatch Georgie back.

"It means you need a better wall," the Doctor finishes gently, and then moves, picking up Rory's organized desk, setting it aside. "So! The only way to close that breach is to open it all the way—the forces will invert, it'll snap itself shut. Or—"

"Or?" Rory asks urgently.

"You know," the Doctor says slowly, turning to them, "when grown-ups tell you everything's going to be fine and you think they're probably lying to make you feel better?"

"Yes," both Rory and Amelia chorus hesitantly.

The Doctor's eyebrows lift, and he says, in a slightly higher-pitched voice, "Everything's going to be _fine._ "

He holds out his hands, and Rory and Amelia both go to grab one—Rory to the left, Amelia to the right, and both just slightly behind, exchanging glances behind this madman's back. But he's a madman who _listened_ when none of the other adults would.

"All right, Rory," the Doctor says, "on the count of three, we're both going to press the button, here, on the sonic screwdriver, all right?"

"Okay," Rory says, and pretends his voice isn't shaking.

"One," the Doctor says softly. "Two... three!"

Rory pushes hesitantly, and then the crack _opens._

A light pushes wide, and they look in to see a dark room, an empty cage at the forefront.

"Prisoner Zero has escaped," the voice booms, a _lot_ louder, and Rory wants to run but the Doctor steps closer.

"Hello?" He asks, lightly, and then, "Hellooooooo...?"

A massive eye descended from the ceiling with a _whoosh,_ and swiveled to stare at the three of them.

Amelia had stopped playing at decorum and she and Rory clung to each other, desperate hands grabbing at shoulders, hobo pack forgotten.

"What's that?" Amelia squeaks out.

A soft _vworp_ sounds, and a near-gentle ball of light, or maybe elecricity, or _something_ floated out and touches against the Doctor's hip. He sits down on the bed with the force of it.

The eye stares at them, harder still, and then the room lit up, and the crack slid shut.

"There," the Doctor says, a touch breathlessly, as Amelia and Rory break their grips on each other. "You see, told you two it would close! Good as new."

"What was that thing?" Rory asks.

"I think," the Doctor says slowly, "that was Prisoner Zero's guard."

"And that ball of—whatever?" Amy chimes in.

"The guard—whatever it was—sent me a lovely little message. Psychic paper, see?"

The paper in question is housed in a little leather case, and whatever psychic paper is glows blue.

" _Prisoner Zero has escaped._ But why tell us? You two spent a whole night listening to that. Unless—"

He stands, and Amelia urges, "Unless _what?_ "

The Doctor looks around. "Unless... Prisoner Zero escaped through here. But he couldn't have—we'd _know_." He dashes out of the room.

Amelia and Rory exchange a glance, and follow, slamming down the steps, right on his heels.

He rambles as he walks, and Rory can't quite make sense of it, even in the years to follow. Then, there was an echoing sound, and a deep bell.

"No, no, no, no, no!" The Doctor shouts, and the spell is broken, running outside, and they follow him again. Rory can feel his heart about to pump right through his pajamas, and Amelia looks wild-eyed with it, bright and eager.

"I've got to get back in there!" the Doctor shouts, as they rush outside. "The engines are phasing, it's going to burn—!"

"But—it's just a box!" Rory splutters, as they stumble to a stop, the Doctor fussing around the smoking box. "How can a box have engines?"

"It's not a box, it's a time machine," the Doctor corrects.

"What, a real one?" Amelia says, disbelieving. " _You've_ got a real time machine?"

"Not for much longer if I can't get her stabilized," the Doctor pants. "Five minute hop into the future should do it—" He hops onto the edge.

"Can we come?" Amelia blurts out.

"Not safe in here, not yet," he says urgently. "Five minutes, you two, just give me five minutes—I'll be right back."

He's about to dive in when Rory mutters, "People always say that."

The Doctor turns to meet two identical, disappointed stares. He immediately hops down from the edge, crouching before the pair of them.

"Am I people?" He asks, staring between the two of them. "Do I even _look_ like people?"

Rory and Amelia exchange a look, and shake their heads.

The Doctor grins, and now Rory can see how it's settling on his face.

"Trust me. I'm the Doctor."

Amelia and Rory both grin back, and the Doctor clambers back onto his box, clinging to the edge. He threw them an experimental wink, and shouts, "GERONIMO!"

He pushes himself in—the doors slam shut—and the box vanishes, fading out and out and out from view until it's gone entirely.

Amelia and Rory both stare, before Amelia tugs at Rory's arm.

"C'mon c'mon c' _mon,_ you've gotta pack before he gets back!" Amelia enthuses.

"Pack?" Rory says. "What for?"

"We're going into a _time machine,_ stupid," Amelia scoffs, and Rory shrugs, before they both race back in—Amelia grabs his suitcase, and Rory grabs his clothes, and they stuff in haphazard handfuls as they go. Rory can feel the excitement kindling between them, and they exchange a gleeful look, before Rory stops, just as they shut the suitcase.

"What about Mels?"

"He can pick up Mels too," Amelia says eagerly. "C'mon, it's a time machine, he can make room for one more."

"Good point," Rory agrees, and they rush outside together—Amelia bundles herself up in one of his da's old golfing jumpers, and Rory buttons up his winter coat, and Amelia jams hats onto both of their heads as they sit on Rory's suitcase and wait.

* * *

It goes a bit differently, after that.

Amelia still becomes _Mad Amelia,_ later _Mad Amy,_ because she's always more eager to tell the story of the _Raggedy Doctor_ than Rory is. She still makes the toys, and goes to psychiatrists, and holds him special in her memory until she starts to lose faith after they hit fourteen.

Rory loses faith after he wakes up, tucked safely into his bed, and not having adventures on a time machine. He thinks it happened—no matter how often he tells his da that it was an imaginative game gone too far, to avoid joining Amy-not-Amelia on her psychiatrist trips, no matter how often the village scoffs at them. He holds fast that it happened.

But he loses faith in the Doctor, as a person.

He starts reading up on physics and time travel theories and decides it must've been a sleight of hand, that's all, a trick of lights, some weird con gone wrong when the guy saw it was two kids.

He and Amy become involved, much to his increasing gratitude and confusion, and Mels teases them about the whole _Raggedy Doctor_ but they grow closer, too, until Mels isn't really teasing him anymore but actually listening to what he has to say.

It starts going differently when Rory gets home from getting sent home early for trying to tell Dr. Ramsden about the coma patients calling for her, and then he sees the man running around his house, screaming for him and Amelia.

Rory reacts before he thinks, and whacks him over the head with one of his da's golf clubs, before he reaches for his cell phone in a panic.

"Amy," he hisses into it, staring mutely at the man, "you have to come over _right now,_ it's an emergency—"

"What, aren't you at work?" Amy says, and he can hear the eyeroll through her tinny voice. "Isn't _everything_ an emergency at a hospital—?"

"No, I'm at home, Amy, listen—I think the Doctor's come back, the Raggedy Doctor, and I need you to come by and tell me I'm not going insane."

There's a long, long stretch of silence.

"Is this supposed to be a joke?"

" _Amy,_ " he hisses into the phone, "If it was measure of our friends who would tease you about the Raggedy Doctor, wouldn't you put your money on Mels?"

"Maybe Mels _is_ teasing you," Amy points out slowly. "Maybe it's a body double or something, or maybe working all those shifts is getting to you—"

Rory is shaking his head wildly, even though she can't see him, poking aggrievedly at the Doctor's face with the stick-end of the club. "Amy, _please._ It's him. It's him exactly as I remember, and you have to come by and tell me I'm not going doo-lally, because if I am, you need to commit me, and if I'm not, _I just knocked out the Raggedy Doctor with a golf club."_

There's another stretch of silence.

"I have a plan," Amy announces over the phone.

So they go with the police charade, Amy using her kissogram outfit and Rory still in his scrubs from work as the Doctor— _it's him, oh my God, it's really him—_ thanks him for the whack over the head, and starts demanding to see Amelia and Rory, it's an emergency, _really_ , and Amy covers it up pretty well while Rory nervously picks at the sleeves of his nurse scrubs. And then the Doctor asks how long.

"Six months," Amy says, nervous with it, and the Doctor scoffs it off, _no, I said five minutes, what's happened to them? What's happened to Rory and Amelia?_

And then the Doctor tells Rory to look in the corner of his eye, behind him, and he lays eyes on a door he's never seen.

"That's... impossible," he says, jaw hanging open. "That's not possible, how—?"

Amelia follows, and they both head for the door, despite the fact that the Raggedy Doctor is shouting at them _not to,_ and Rory feels a little thrill of rebellion despite the _fear_ of it.

The fear starts setting in a bit deeper when the screwdriver has hopped up onto the table on its own.

Amy reaches forwards, and prises it loose of the odd, gel stuff, and Rory reaches.

They cling to each other's shoulders like they're kids again, and then the Doctor tells them to look out of the corner of their eye and then to _not_ look at it.

And, of course, they both look at it.

Amy screams, and Rory yells, and they both run out of there, Amy thrusting the screwdriver towards the Doctor, and the whole charade falls apart as Amy lets down her hair.

And then one of his coma patients steps out of the door, along with a dog.

"That's not possible," Rory says, jaw hanging open. "That's not _possible_ , they're coma patients, they're in my ward, I _knew—"_

"Of course!" The Doctor says eagerly. "Psychic link, live feed—but how did you fix that?"

The Doctor tries to talk them out of it, but then their alibis get crossed— _the human residence will be incinerated—_ and the Doctor slams the screwdriver against the carpet. He frees himself at last, and the Doctor screams at them to run, and Rory feels oddly nostalgic as they rush out.

"Kissogram?" the Doctor demands.

"You broke into my boyfriend's house, it was either this, French Maid, or the nurse would have kept hitting you over the head with a golf club," Amy snaps back.

"What is _going on?_ " Rory demands. "Why is a coma patient in my _house?_ "

The Doctor tries to get them into the time machine, and they try to run.

He stops for the shed. Rory and Amy exchange a look of slight horror, as he reaches out, and whips back around, and demands to know why they said six months.

"Why did you say _five minutes?_ " Rory seethes. He doesn't yell it, he doesn't scream, he _seethes,_ and the Doctor blinks before looking between them.

"What," he whispers.

"C'mon," Amy urges.

" _What._ "

"COME ON!" Rory shouts, and Amy tugs them both to the little country path.

"You're Amelia, and you're Rory," the Doctor accuses, and Amy keeps walking, grabbing Rory's hand in hers and pulling him along.

"You're _late,"_ she snaps back.

"Amelia Pond—and Rory Williams—"

"Yes, I'm Amelia, he's Rory, and you're _late."_

"What happened?" the Doctor demands.

"Twelve years—"

"—he hit me with a golf club, you hit me with a _golf club—_ "

"Twelve years," Rory says at least.

"A golf club!"

"Twelve years, and four psychiatrists," Amy snaps back.

" _Four?!"_

"She kept biting them," Rory adds. It's a point of pride.

" _Why?!"_

"They said you weren't real," Amy mutters, and then the guard starts blaring over the ice cream truck.

The day continues, mad, impossible, surreal—they go to Jeff's house, the Doctor looks disappointed over Amy's name change, but Amy snaps back, and then he starts complaining about Leadworth, which makes _Rory_ snap back, and then the sky lights up with a forcefield, and Rory just kind of gives up on rationality, at this point.

And then the Doctor gives him back Georgie.

Rory cradles it in his hands, and looks at Amy, and Amy looks back at it, and Rory clears his throat awkwardly, trying so desperately hard to picture a mother he couldn't remember, and tucks it into his pocket.

"We'll help him," Rory murmurs, and looks towards Amy, who still looks furious. "For now."

"For now," Amy agrees, glowers at the Doctor for effects, and then they figure out _multi-form_ and there's a giant eye again, and they crash into the hospital.

Rory's really hoping they save the world in a great way, because if they don't, Rory will be dead, or fired, or possibly both.

And then the Doctor does a clever thing and everything goes to zero.

And then Rory collapses to the ground, the Doctor and Amy rushing to his side, and then the Doctor stands with a grown Rory, sneering and looking so so wrong beside him.

(Amy was still the one who had problems with growing up; Rory just had to grow up a bit quicker.)

He dreams about what he saw, and then the Doctor calls the aliens _back to earth again,_ and Rory loses any semblance of chill he ever had.

Amy doesn't turn her back when he changes. Rory feels a brief spike of jealousy and his brain unhelpfully provides the time when she'd made him dress up as the Raggedy Doctor for Halloween one year.

The Doctor delivers a jaw-dropping speech, and Amy laughs, and Rory grins too, and the the Doctor runs and leaves them again.

They sit together in the garden, silent, until the sun rises.

* * *

It goes rather similarly, after that, except the Doctor bursts out of a cake first and then crash-lands in _Amy's_ garden, this time, after Rory has to blink out a stone angel and was surrounded by soldiers and a woman with a mysterious, pensive smile, and he staggers into her arms. Rory helps save the star-whale, and Rory meets Churchill, and Rory manages to nurse Bracewell through it, thinking of Amy when he hears the Scottish accent with a twist in his belly. Amy is still the one to get taken by fish-vampires, and it is still Amy's choice.

Amy is still eaten down into the earth and it is still Rory that is shot, and Rory is still saved by the crack in his wall to be reborn as _Rorarius_ and doesn't correct Amy when she calls him Roranicus.

(It may have been his wall but Amelia-then-Amy barged into his home often enough, made investigating it her passion, and was just mad enough to make it all work out.)

The Doctor recognizes what he's missing immediately.

Amy is still trapped in the Pandorica for one thousand, eight hundred, and ninety-four years. She's worth every single one.

When the Doctor seals himself into the Pandorica, though, he calls them both forwards. He implored for the pair of them to remember; if they could both save Rory from certain death, they could certainly survive in a world without him. He asks them both, beseechingly, if waiting was worth it. They both tell him to shut up, and Amy calls Rory stupid, and the Doctor tells Rory to bring back his mother.

"How?" He asks helplessly. "I can't even remember her name, how am I supposed to bring her back?"

The Doctor smiles, smudges of soot staining his cheeks, and it is a familiar thing, now. "She didn't recognize her wedding ring, you know," he tells Rory, like he's telling a secret. "People always leave things behind."

It comes to Rory like a clap of lightning.

When they're huddling over each other, waiting for the world to implode, Rory holds Georgie fierce and clear in his mind as Amy snakes her arms around his shoulders, clinging tight, one last big adventure with their Raggedy Doctor.

Rory bursts into tears when his mother shakes him awake, beaming. He doesn't particularly know why, but he hugs his little mum tight, staring at her honey-turned-gray curls with something like dread, like he's forgetting something really important.

But at the wedding, Rory is the one to cry bemusedly over the worn blue diary, and Amy looks suspiciously weepy too. The pair of them bring him back together, clinging to each other's shoulders, and they both hop over the table to greet him eagerly.

The Doctor dances with everyone at the wedding. That includes Rory. Rory barely makes it through, but Amy captures enough blackmail evidence on video to probably take down galaxies.

Now, the Doctor calls them _the Children Who Waited,_ the _Boy Who Waited_ and the _Girl Who Waited_ , despite the fact that they weren't children, never were, really. But they were, would always be, to him.

They still see the Doctor die-but-not-really. Amy still shoots the astronaut, and Rory still seethes, always seethes, at the Doctor when the device is left behind. _She can always hear me._ They had suffered through years and years of waiting together. Rory throws the Children Who Waited into his face, and the Doctor goes stony. Amy comes, and she helps patch it up, like she usually does.

Amy still fights pirates, Rory still swoons over a Siren, and Rory still has to apologize for it. The Doctor immediately goes to join Rory but Amy beats him to the punch, jabbing the needle into her finger first, glowering at the Doctor like it's a challenge.

Rory is still sucked in by a girl that seems helpless but is dangerous and acidic and a monster wearing that girl's face. It's the caretaker in him. He still lets go of Amy when the Doctor prompts. He still dons himself in the armor of the Centurion and weeps when he holds his daughter and weeps when he loses her again.

They still struggle through losing their daughter to find her again in someone centuries older (or younger, depending on your point of view) than them. Or maybe, the third option, she was standing right beside them the whole time.

When his daughter regenerates with his mother's crazy honey curls, he wants to start crying all over again. He feels like a proud father, pointing out her ancestor's marks on her face.

He supposes that's accurate enough.

Rory is the one left in Apalapucia, this time, and it is enough to stretch Amy's faith to the breaking point as she screams and throws the glasses and cradles Rory's old, leathered face in her palms. She sobs when she presses her hand against the TARDIS door and sobs harder still after a young Rory quietly bundles her into his arms after the hand falls away, and he whispers quiet reassurances into her neck, rocking her back and forth as she cries and cries. _We're the Children Who Waited,_ Rory whispers to her, _I'd wait for you over and over._

The older Rory still didn't have faith. Rory doesn't think that's a shock.

Amy's faith is tested again when she's still the one to find her door, and Rory is unsurprised to find his lack of faith. He is surprised when the Doctor convinces her to break hers, though, and holds her close again.

They still don't know each other when time fractures and is close to breaking. They still give their daughter away to their best friend. They still celebrate together when their daughter tells them their best friend is alive, after all.

Amy still flits from job to job, and Rory still works as a steadfast nurse. They fret over waiting together, it's in their name, their very title. _The Children Who Waited._ The Children rush into the TARDIS gleefully together, and they mourn together, and they wait and wait and _wait_ together.

They still nearly get divorced, and Amy is still the one to lose her wristband, and the argument still stumbles out of grief-stricken lips that meet while a world tumbles down around their ears. Rory couldn't really bring himself to care.

Brian Williams still manages to discover that the Doctor is, actually, properly real when he gets taken to see dinosaurs (the reason both Brian and Mels weren't at the wedding was because Mels had to be bailed out and Brian had quietly offered himself up) and he stares at them and apologizes, which they both wave off. They've heard and seen much worse than some small town people thinking they're mad.

Amy is still the one to talk the Doctor down from killing Jex, firing a gun into the air. Rory still runs with the townsfolk and paints the markings on his face. They worry together between waiting, over the Doctor's sudden and forceful turn to this.

Amy and Rory are left still waiting when the cubes come by, and they still join him when defeating the Shakri, and they still race into the ship when it's offered.

Rory is still the first to get taken by the Angels.

When they are in New York, decades before they're born, when it gets to be too much, they still cling to each other's shoulders, and they still stay together.

They're the Children Who Waited. They have all the time in the world.

* * *

This was published on my AO3 account under the same name, batterytriplicate. I also have a tumblr, also batterytriplicate! Come ask me some questions or geek out with me about how underrated Rory Williams is.


End file.
